


You’re a God (& I am not) | A Knights of Cydonia Side Story

by crinklefries



Series: Knights of Cydonia [2]
Category: Football RPF, Sports RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-17
Updated: 2013-06-17
Packaged: 2017-12-15 07:11:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/846761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crinklefries/pseuds/crinklefries
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>From the final chapter in Sergio’s section in <span class="u">Knights of Cydonia</span>—<i>The lines are so far gone that the only thing that remains is a deep ache in Sergio’s chest and a conscious fear that there’s no way this can’t end in a broken heart. It’s happened before, Sergio thinks. He doesn’t know if it can survive it again.</i></p><p>This is a companion side piece to <span class="u">Knights of Cydonia</span>, but it is not necessary to have read Knights to read this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You’re a God (& I am not) | A Knights of Cydonia Side Story

**Author's Note:**

> **Notes:** A SerIker side story/backstory to Knights of Cydonia. **This can be read as a stand-alone fic** , though, no reading of the actual fic is needed!
> 
> If you _are_ reading the entire fic, first of all thank you so very much. ♥ Secondly, this provides important insight into Sergio’s character, his motivations, why he is the way he is, etc. etc. Foundational, basically.
> 
> Title from [You’re a God by Vertical Horizon](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynseZlJURJo), lyrics appropriate to the overall feeling/theme.

It isn’t like it is in the story books. They don’t live side-by-side as children. The older boy isn’t best friends with his brother. They aren’t even best friends with each other. They don’t grow up together. They barely know each other for the longest time. 

It’s a lot more ordinary than that, a lot less fairytale and a lot more actual reality. It starts the day that Sergio, sitting on his living room couch and listening to flamenco on his brother’s discman, looks out the window and sees a large moving van outside the house next door. The house is larger than his own, big and white and sprawls over two yards instead of the usual one. Sergio is old enough to know the difference between rich and poor and his family is neither, but neither is this particular neighborhood. The size of his new neighbor’s house barely means anything at all; that house has lain on the market for years now, the real estate agent desperate to sell it to absolutely anyone who is willing to take it. (Truthfully, it’s not that it’s a bad house. There are just stories; the kinds of stories that parents tell their children and children tell each other, stories that make beds go bump in the night and children creep out the back door and meet their friends halfway down the street with flashlights and jackets pulled tight, just for a glimpse of a ghost or a werewolf.) 

As long as Sergio has lived in his house with his family (and it’s been quite a while, namely since he was born) the house next door has been abandoned. Like all of the children in his neighborhood, he had broken in once or twice, but he had never found a ghost or a vampire or even so much as a haunted snail, so he had eventually given up trying. To a thirteen year old boy, though, a new neighbor is, perhaps, just as exciting as a poltergeist or a demon. 

He pauses his disc and stretches his long, lanky limbs before pushing himself off the couch and to his feet. He leaves his brother’s discman on the couch and ambles over to the door, pushes it open, and steps out into the thick Andalucian heat. It wraps around him immediately, like a thick suffocating blanket, and within minutes his long hair is clinging to his face. 

Sergio wrinkles his nose and pushes stray strands off his forehead and to the side. He ignores the strands clinging to his neck and steps toward the moving van, hands in his pockets, slightly tight pink shirt clinging to his thin frame. He’s only thirteen years old, but he already has a slight build from years of playing football at the park with the boys and at school for the team. 

He thinks that he’ll meet an older man or an older woman when he reaches the van and usually that would make a teenager hesitate, but Sergio has never been particularly shy or particularly hesitant. He sticks his face in the window and peers in to the driver’s cab. It’s empty, although keys are dangling from the ignition. 

Sergio scoots his body along the van, knuckles rapping lightly against the iron body until he reaches the back. Then he skips around the open door, ready to announce himself and greet his new neighbor.

“Hello!” he exclaims brightly, even before he’s seen who it is. 

“Who—Ow! Shit! Fuck!” 

Sergio hears a stream of curses as a male voice from inside bumps his head on something and then stumbles and bumps something else. Sergio blinks and covers his mouth so that he won’t laugh and be _completely_ rude. 

It’s just a few seconds before a body emerges from the dark interior where there is a pile of furniture stacked unsteadily. 

Sergio was expecting an older man or an older woman; maybe someone his mother’s age or his father’s age or his youngest uncle, even. What he’s not expecting is for the voice to belong to someone young—actually _young_. Older than Sergio, sure. Probably his brother’s age. 

The boy is somewhat taller than Sergio, although not by much, which is either a testament to his short stature or the growth spurt Sergio’s been in the middle of for the past year. He has short brown hair that sticks to his forehead and neck, large brown eyes that are confused, a small pointed nose, pale skin, and the longest eyelashes Sergio has ever seen. He’s wearing a Real Madrid jersey that’s entirely too big for him.

“They’re my favorite team too!” Sergio exclaims excitedly, forgetting that he hasn’t even introduced himself yet. Forgetting, really, that the other boy hasn’t even said anything yet. The other boy’s kind of looking at him like he’s an alien, actually. Or, at least, like Sergio is nothing (and nobody) he has ever seen before.

“Thanks?” the other boy finally says. His voice sounds as uncertain as he looks. 

“Are you moving in next door?” Sergio asks immediately thereafter, not particularly caring whether or not the boy needs time to process his next-door-neighbor’s sudden presence. 

“I—” the older boy squints, his forehead scrunching, before it smoothes out in sudden realization. “Oh. Do you live in the blue house?”

“Yup,” Sergio grins and, without even waiting for an invitation, climbs up into the moving van. “Need help?”

The other boy shifts on his feet and looks unsure, but then something seems to click as though he’s just realized how many boxes and pieces of furniture are piled up and around him. 

“Yeah, sure,” he nods. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Sergio immediately bends down to grab a box of _something_. He doesn’t think that he needs an introduction, or maybe it’s just been too long since he’s had one here. 

The older boy scratches at his head before bending down to lift a box too. 

“What’s your—”

“Oh! Sergio!” the young boy says and smiles widely over his shoulder. “Sergio Ramos.”

There must be something in the midst of white teeth and lively brown eyes that his new neighbor sees, because the older boy’s expression relaxes and he smiles back.

“Iker. Iker Casillas.”

 

It’s not something he had planned; eying the boy next door. At thirteen years old, Sergio is old enough to know he’s not like the other boys, to know that what they feel and what he feels is vastly different. Mostly he keeps it to himself; tucks it away in a little corner that’s preserved for him and only him. He’s thought about telling his parents, telling his brothers, and it’s not that he’s ashamed or has ever felt anything less than normal. It’s more that it’s a piece that’s so personal to him, that’s so close to his heart, that he’s afraid to show it to anyone else for fear of becoming something less than himself.

At thirteen years old, Sergio Ramos has more pride in himself and who he is than most adults do. 

The way it starts, like their meeting, is inconspicuous enough. His mother berates him for meeting Iker Casillas without taking food with him or inviting him to dinner later. It’s an easy enough request to fulfill and soon enough, the nervous, uncomfortable college boy joins them in their dining room for dinner. He loosens up after the first course and he’s so intelligent and has such a diverse range of interests that Sergio’s mother and father are immediately smitten. His older brother seems to smile more at dinner. Jesus simply nods his head with the conversation, but even he adds in a joke or two. Sergio’s family isn’t ever particularly morose, but there’s always a looseness to them when they have company and Iker is easy-going enough to easily be one of the best. 

There’s something about the college boy that’s different than anyone else that Sergio has met; a calm confidence and strict regiment that is carefully hidden beneath corners of nerves and propriety. He’s never too proper or formal, but he values respect and every once in a while, he’ll tell an unsuspecting joke that makes the entire room shake with laughter. It’s a strange combination, but the result isn’t strain, it’s a familiarity that Sergio feels wash over the seams of his family.

Iker smiles more as Paqui pours him more sangria and by the end of dinner, he’s engaged in an animated discussion about Real Madrid with Sergio’s father. Sergio’s father, an avid football fan, discusses tactics and past wins, their chances to win El Clasico, and the merits of the youth system. He doesn’t always agree with Iker, but whenever the college boy makes a point he can’t refute, he shakes his head and pats Iker on the shoulder as though he’s been outwitted and Iker Casillas is the sole cause of it. Sergio feels kind of proud to have discovered him, but he feels an unexpected pang of jealousy as he pushes the beans around on his plate. 

There are few things Sergio feels as sharply as jealousy and it’s always been one of his faults, he knows. He’s a son of the people, a boy who thrives on attention and affection and when he craves it, it’s not something he can shake simply by closing his eyes and rationalizing. When he’s jealous, when he craves that attention, it eats at him from the inside. It manifests physically; tightening throat, stomachache, slightly trembling arms and a dull headache that pounds at his temples. Maybe it’s ridiculous in all of the most ridiculous ways, but he tries to control himself the best he can. Or, at least, Jesus has tried to teach him patience. 

Sergio’s not sure that he has ever succeeded, but he supposes, often, that if God had wanted him to be straight, he would have been. Similarly, if God had wanted him to be patient—well, the same principle applied.

It’s not particularly a problem at dinner because Iker doesn’t exactly ignore him. On the contrary, he laughs easily at Sergio’s jokes, engages his topics of conversation when the teenager tries, flashes him warm smiles when it’s warranted, and even bumps their elbows, accidentally, twice. 

Sergio is a jealous young boy, but he’s not uncontrollable. He tries to engage the older boy more in talk during dessert, but gives up trying when Iker falls back to discussing football formations with his father and older brother. It never turns uncomfortable, but Sergio feels uncomfortably drawn to him and by the end of the night, he has to excuse himself because there’s a dull migraine starting at his temples and working its way through to his fingertips. 

Iker looks at him in concern as he passes, but Sergio just smiles and shakes his head.

“Welcome to the neighborhood, hombre,” he says easily, because he’s Sergio.

Maybe it’s his imagination, but he likes to think that Iker looked particularly disappointed as he left.

 

That’s only the beginning. It’s not exactly the makings of a stalker if he lives next door, Sergio rationalizes. Iker has a lot of friends come over to his house—mostly young men who probably go to university with him. Sometimes young women. Mostly young men.

Sergio tries, once or twice, to figure out whether the college student swings one way or another, but mostly he just figures out that Iker Casillas is not only intelligent and charming, but, as captain of his college football team, he has a _lot_ of friends and he probably doesn’t want anything to do with someone who’s barely in his teens. 

He tries to ignore that fact, accept that fact, but it just makes him more determined to have what he can’t have.

It starts out slowly enough; Sergio knocking on Iker’s door to see how he’s doing (his father’s request) or Sergio meeting him at his mailbox to ask him how his classes are (it’s the neighborly thing to do) or Sergio inviting Iker over for dinner (his mother insisted). Each time, Sergio shows up with a simple smile and a simple request or question or invitation and each time, Iker, for some reason, possibly because he’s actually a nice guy, responds with an easy smile and a laugh of his own. After a while, Sergio begins to linger; lingers against Iker’s front door, lingers at the mailbox, lingers outside of Iker’s car window after he’s pulled in to the driveway. If Iker notices, he says nothing, and after a while, Sergio even convinces himself that they’re no longer neighbors, but actually friends.

 

It’s not an obsession per se, just an endless fascination with someone he can’t see, with something he can’t have. He stares at his ceiling at night, wondering things he shouldn’t be wondering and it’s only when he refuses to stop tossing and turning in his squeaky bed that Jesus throws a pillow at him from his across the room to get Sergio to shut up. Sergio’s response is to bury his face in his own pillow and wonder if the rest of his teenage years are going to be like this, because he’s perfectly content to lay burrowed just where he is for the next seven years if that’s the case.

 

Sergio is laying on his stomach in his front yard, awkwardly long limbs half sprawled on him and half sprawled on his friend Antonio. They’re murmuring lazily together and Antonio has just sleepily buried his face into the crook of Sergio’s neck when Sergio hears a car pull up next door. Iker’s car is already parked in the driveway, so Sergio lifts his head curiously to see who’s come. 

The worn, yellow Mustang is certainly one Sergio’s never seen before. The door slides open and a young man shuffles out. He’s not particularly tall and he looks maybe a year or two older than Iker, but he’s not unattractive. With hair that’s vaguely spiked up and an awkward stub of a goatee on his chin, he’s a cross between something dangerous, something unreachable, and something that is, in Sergio’s opinion, trying entirely too hard. He pulls a leather jacket around him and shuts his door before pocketing his keys. He grins as he walks up to Iker’s door and knocks.

Sergio’s breath stills in his chest and he doesn’t even notice Antonio roll off of him and look up curiously with his friend. 

It takes Iker a minute to answer the door, but when he does, he looks startled, at first, nervous, at second, and finally almost shyly pleased. He says something, but Sergio’s too far away to see. The teenager cranes his head so that he can catch wisps of the conversation, but he’s only partially successful.

“Of course I came,” Iker’s friend laughs loudly. “How could I not, after—”

Iker shushes him and looks around nervously. He spots Sergio looking at him from the yard next door and frowns. Sergio cautiously waves, but there’s something troubled in Iker’s eyes. He doesn’t wave back.

Instead, he whispers something else to his friend, shakes his head, and grabs at his elbow. 

“So nervous, ay dios mio!” his friend says again, loudly, and looks almost aggravatingly amused as Iker pulls him into his house and shuts the door with a slam behind them. 

Sergio frowns and his heart beats strangely fast in his chest, as though he’s just been caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to be doing. It’s a strange sensation, especially given the jealousy that’s creeping at the edge of his vision now. He can feel it, it’s so tangible. 

“No, Sese,” he hears a quiet voice at his elbow. 

Sergio turns back to Antonio, having temporarily forgotten that he was there, and his friend shakes his head sadly. 

Sergio thinks he knows what Antonio means, but they’ve never spoken about it, so he lets it go. Instead, he buries his face into Antonio’s chest and lets his friend stroke his back until he finally relaxes. 

 

Antonio and Jesus agree that Sergio is too stubborn for his own good. It’s not that Sergio doesn’t agree; it’s more that when he gets something into his head, it’s almost impossible for him to shake it away. The more he tries to focus on his school work, on his school mates, on his own football team, the more he thinks about Iker. 

It’s not particularly smart of him, but Sergio has had a dull pressure in his head for the past week or so and has snapped at Jesus at least a dozen times in the same amount of time. He figures if he doesn’t at least get himself invited in, he’s going to go crazy. Or make Jesus cry.

He shows up at Iker’s front door, a pile of videos in hand because it’s the only excuse he could think of. He knocks, lightly at first and then a little firmer as his resolve grows. Iker is usually good about answering his door—it never takes him longer than a minute. Sergio waits patiently, albeit nervously, for a boy who never comes. 

He bites his lower lip as he shifts his weight from one leg to another. He remembers hearing Iker’s car pull up in front of the house the night before and his car is certainly there, so there’s no reason why he shouldn’t be answering the door. Sergio tries the doorknob, but the front door is locked. 

Sergio’s worried, or at least that’s what he tells himself. He leaves the pile of videos in front of the door and tries to look in through the relatively large window that’s beside it. It looks into a mostly bare dining room, with a small, rickety dinner table that seems to uncertain in its ability to hold itself up for much longer given the stack of political science textbooks careening out of control on top of it. There’s no one there, though, so Sergio hops away from the window and winds his way around the side of the house. 

Most of the windows are up higher than he can reach, but there a few on ground level that he knows he’s now tall enough to look through. The one to the kitchen, like the window to the dining room, holds no results. It’s only when Sergio finds the window to the living room that he notices movement inside. 

He moves closer to the pane of glass, curious and almost relieved that Iker hasn’t somehow _died_ inside. 

It’s only when he’s right up against the window pane that he can actually _see_.

Sergio freezes, heart thudding to a painful, jarring hold near the side of his stomach. 

He doesn’t have to see the clothes on the floor to realize both Iker and his friend are barely dressed. They’re both in boxers and Iker’s friend has him pinned against the other side of the couch. One of his friend’s hands is splayed tightly against Iker’s pale hip, fingers digging in slightly under the elastic of his boxers. The other hand isn’t particularly visible, mostly because his friend’s back is to Sergio, but from Iker’s abrupt movements and the dull sounds of moans from inside, Sergio can imagine what it’s doing. The other man’s mouth seems to be latched onto Iker’s throat and it moves in conjunction with his hand and Sergio forgets to close his eyes when Iker bucks up into him. 

“ _Fuck, David_ ,” he groans load enough for Sergio to hear. Sergio’s not sure how he can hear it above the sound of his own heavy, strangled breathing. 

_David_ laughs as he presses harder into Iker and Sergio feels that sound wrap around his insides and curdle in his gut. Maybe that’s what makes the acid rise to his throat. 

Maybe that’s what makes Sergio do, possibly, the stupidest thing he’s ever done. Almost unconsciously, he raises his knuckles and raps them loudly against the window. 

The movements inside hesitate for just a moment, as though Iker and David aren’t sure of what they’ve heard. Sergio makes sure to solve that for them. He pounds against the window again, even harder, almost desperately. 

This time, Iker and David _both_ hear it. Iker’s eyes fly open to the window as David scrambles to extract himself from the other boy. Sergio thinks that Iker hasn’t seen him, but then the older boy’s face turns pale and his jaw slackens. For his part, David turns around as well. When he sees Sergio, his face twists from a slight frown to something resembling anger.

“ _What the fuck_ ,” Sergio hears, but he’s not paying attention to David. He probably looks as hurt and crushed as he feels, but a strangely strong shock reverberates through him when he realizes that Iker looks the same.

 

Sergio avoids Iker for the next few weeks. He stops meeting him at his front door, stops meeting him at his mailbox, stops inviting him to dinner. Sergio’s parents don’t seem to notice, although his brothers and Antonio frown at him a lot more, as though they _know_. Iker, for his part, avoids Sergio as well, although maybe he would have done that anyway. After all, Sergio thinks bitterly, what would he want with a thirteen year old when he had someone like _that_.

Still, an obsession isn’t something that’s easy to rid and Sergio lies awake more often than not with his window open, listening for sounds of Iker’s car driving in at night or snippets from his phone conversations whenever he takes them outside.

 

His stomach is hurting one night when he turns in bed and, instinctively by this point, breathes quieter in order to listen for Iker. Jesus usually snores lightly, but tonight even he is breathing easily. The night is almost eerily quiet in that sense. By the time that Iker’s car pulls in to his driveway, it’s nearly three in the morning and Sergio is sleepily wondering why he seems to be coming home later and later these days.

When he hears Iker’s voice float up, it’s too loud, too strained, and Sergio doesn’t have to hear full sentences to know that it’s because Iker’s drunk. He lies still at first. 

“No no David, I—David, Dave.” Iker’s loud voice stutters to a halt and Sergio can almost see the frown creasing between his eyebrows. “But you said—”

There’s silence for a few seconds and Sergio scoots closer to the edge of his bed that borders the window. 

“I know.” Iker’s voice is so quiet this time that Sergio almost doesn’t catch what’s next. He crawls out of bed and leans up under the window so that he can hear better. He looks over his shoulder to make sure that Jesus is still sleeping. He is. “I know, David. I’m trying. Will you wait—”

Sergio creeps up so that he can peek over the window ledge down to the driveway next door. Iker’s leaning heavily against his car. He’s wearing a familiar leather jacket that’s too big for him, with a cell phone cradled between his neck and ear. One hand is rubbing his face and the other is carefully holding a cigarette to his mouth. 

He pauses his conversation to shift and move his cigarette away so that he can let out a plume of smoke. Sergio’s never seen Iker smoke before. 

He hears Iker tsk in frustration and he shakes his head so vehemently that his entire body sways from the movement. He catches his balance against the car, though, and he curses as his cigarette goes tumbling out of his fingers.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he mutters and grinds the heel of his shoes into the tip so that the lit end dies down. Then he scrunches his face and sighs into the cell phone. “No, not you. I’m— I’m tired and drunk, David. Call me later?”

Iker nods as he flips his phone shut. He sighs heavily and leans even more against the car before hoisting himself off. Sergio thinks, for a second, that Iker’s eyes flicker up to his window, but he decides he must be imagining it because Iker stumbles into his doorway and disappears into his house a second later. 

 

Iker keeps coming home later and later. Sometimes it’s so late that Sergio barely hears his alarm in the morning. Jesus has to shake him awake on those mornings and when he looks at Sergio with concern in those large, blue eyes, Sergio just mutters that he worries too much. 

More often than not these nights, when Sergio hears Iker’s door slam shut, he winces. It’s never because of the hour and always because of the conversation that follows. It’s never the same conversation, but it’s always with the same person and Iker’s always drunk, always loud, always smoking one too many cigarettes, always so subtly sad that Sergio has to lean his cheek against the cool of his wall and close his own eyes because his chest hurts in response. 

More often than not, Iker fights with David. Sergio never figures out what they’re fighting about, but it always sounds like one person is waiting for the other. Given how upset Iker’s voice usually sounds, he figures that it’s him. Sergio notices when the yellow Mustang stops showing up altogether. He figures that it’s related. He always wants to intervene, but never does. 

 

It isn’t until the night when Sergio hears Iker’s car come home, but silence follow thereafter that he moves. At first, he takes his usual place at the window, but this time he doesn’t hear Iker on the telephone. Instead, the pale boy’s body struggles out of the driver’s side and barely manages to close the door before it slides down the body of the car. Iker rests on the ground, knees pulled up to his chest, and his hand gropes the inside of his jacket for a pack. His jacket isn’t the leather one tonight.

Sergio doesn’t know why he feels tonight is different, why tonight will hold anything that the past month, two months hasn’t held. He doesn’t even know what he thinks he can accomplish, but he slips into jeans and a t-shirt, throws a jacket on and quietly bounds downstairs and out the front door. He closes it carefully behind him and it’s only a few seconds’ walk until he’s standing just out of Iker’s current vision, but close enough that his presence can be felt. 

There’s a minute of silence before Iker shakes his head and laughs bitterly.

“Go away, Sergio.” 

Sergio frowns, the words twisting into stomach. He takes a step toward the older boy. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” He decides that he’s not going to be nice about it. Why should he, when Iker seems to need the opposite? 

Iker laughs again and takes a long drag of his cigarette before letting his head fall back against the car. 

“Long story, kid.”

Sergio’s frown deepens and this time he’s irritated.

“I’m not a fucking kid, Iker. What the fuck is going on with you?” He’s not afraid to show it. 

Iker lets out a harsh breath of smoke before opening his eyes. When he looks at Sergio, Sergio feels strange. He’s not a kid, he’s sure of it, but Iker makes him doubt it, somehow. Before those intelligent, scrutinizing eyes—now dulled with alcohol and something that looks softly like heartbreak—Sergio feels as though he’s been laid bare; nothing more than a child who thinks he knows the world but barely knows the back of his palm. Still, Sergio is more headstrong than that. He looks back at Iker unwaveringly. 

This time, it’s Iker who flinches. 

“You saw, that day.” It’s not a question. 

“Yeah.” 

“You left your movies on the doorstep.”

“Yeah.”

A pause. 

“I’m sorry.”

Sergio furrows his eyebrows and scoots closer to Iker. He allows himself a second to think before he bends down in front of the older boy.

“I’m not a kid, Iker.” 

Iker looks into his eyes again. The gaze is excruciating, penetrating. Sergio feels as though he’s undergoing a test that he doesn’t know the questions or the answers to. He swallows and hopes that’s enough to pass. 

“I didn’t know, at that age,” Iker finally breathes out. His words are just soft enough for Sergio to feel against his skin. He thinks Iker’s heart is breaking and he can just barely see. “But you do, don’t you?”

For the first time in a long time, Sergio averts his eyes. He stares at Iker’s knees and then at his shoes and then at his own hands. They’re long and pale under the moon and he’s always wondered how that works because he’s never fair otherwise. 

He feels his heart thud erratically in his chest and when he nods, his face warms under the cool night air.

“Yeah.”

Sergio feels, rather than sees Iker’s gaze on him. The older boy’s fingers twitch and Sergio sees, rather than feels _that_. 

“You’re not happy.” The observation is simple, almost child-like. But under the cold blanket of the dark morning sky, it almost seems profound.

“No,” Iker admits. He exhales smoke and flicks the stub of his cigarette over Sergio’s shoulder. It lands silently in the grass, but Sergio doesn’t pay attention.

“Is it because of him?” Sergio asks. He rests his hands on Iker’s knee as he moves closer. The college boy stirs, but when he looks at Sergio now, it’s almost blank.

“Yeah.” There’s something ambiguous about his tone, but Sergio doesn’t know enough to worry about it. 

There’s a profound pause that’s almost pregnant with expectation. Maybe it’s Iker’s expectations of Sergio or Sergio’s expectations of Iker, but not knowing which is which, Sergio thinks that maybe it’s the expectation of what might happen next and then next and then next.

He decides on the truth.

“I could be better for you,” Sergio says nervously, almost shyly. And maybe he is, but there’s also that slick, cool confidence that emanates just enough for Iker to clearly be taken aback. 

He stirs more at those words than he has in a while. 

Sergio can feel the words on Iker’s lips, the hesitation that comes with moral inclinations or, at least, the pretense that ethics are as inherent as breathing. He doesn’t believe in that, so he doesn’t let Iker either. 

Sergio doesn’t wait for an answer. It isn’t so much bold as it is brash, but both describe the young man perfectly. He doesn’t wait. He never waits. 

His fingers fist around the older boy’s collar and he forcibly drags Iker’s lips forward to meet his own. Iker seems unstable and surprised at first, but Sergio can taste the alcohol and cigarette on his lips, so maybe it’s not so surprising. 

Iker freezes under Sergio’s touch and the boy expects this, so he doesn’t relent. Instead, he presses closer, one hand on Iker’s knee. Maybe the college boy is too tired or maybe he is too drunk, but eventually, Sergio’s efforts pay off.

Iker relaxes, breathes into him, and sets his fingers widely apart on the back of Sergio’s neck so that he can tug him forward. Sergio settles comfortably on his knees as Iker flattens his legs and spreads them so that the younger boy can shuffle forward between them. 

He’s not sure _exactly_ what to do, but he places his hands on either side of Iker’s neck and leans in eagerly, confidence seemingly appearing where there really isn’t any. Sergio isn’t an expert, but he can certainly pretend to be one.

Iker’s hesitation quickly fades and Sergio thinks the inebriation has finally taken over, because he moves faster against the younger boy. He doesn’t actually do anything, but he, unknowingly, teaches Sergio how to open his mouth, teaches him how to lick into the other, teaches him what the tongue is for, teaches him how to taste someone, really _taste_ them. 

Iker tastes like some kind of sharp alcohol that Sergio has never had and the acrid smoke of cigarettes that Sergio has never tried. Underneath it, Sergio thinks he can taste something else, but he can’t put his finger on it and his heart is beating so fast and his skin is heating so much that he’s distracted either way. He opens his eyes and then he closes them. His fingers hesitate on cool skin, before they curl around Iker’s neck and Sergio almost thinks he can get away with it.

 

They spend some time together like that, tilting heads and insistent lips, until the cold settles in through their thin jackets and pierces needles into their skin. When Iker finally pushes Sergio away, both of their lips are swollen and Sergio is flushed and happy. Iker is mostly drunk and tired. They both stumble back to their respective houses without a word.

It’s Sergio’s first real kiss—and second and third—but he doesn’t tell Iker that, ever.

 

It’s only awkward when both people let it be awkward and Sergio has never been the type to tolerate that. At thirteen years old, maybe he doesn’t have a sense of tact, but mostly he doesn’t have a sense of patience. After a few seconds of Iker shifting on his feet and watching him uncomfortably, Sergio grins and throws his arm around the older boy’s shoulder and begins questioning about the game the other night. Iker stiffens under the teenager’s touch, but relaxes as soon as he starts explaining the genius of Luis Figo to Sergio.

It happens like that often, that moment of hesitation and a hidden kind of abject fear and trepidation on Iker’s face. Every time he looks like he’s going to say something, like maybe this time he’s going to protest because somehow, on some level, this isn’t _right_. But Sergio never lets him get that far. If it’s in the corner of Iker’s yard, he curls his fingers into the older boy’s collar and drags him around the side of the house so that he can shut him up with hands and lips. If it’s in front of the mailbox, he swipes a thumb over the inside of Iker’s wrist until his protestations stutter to a halt. If it’s inside Iker’s house, he simply shoves the older boy back against the couch cushions without permission and crawls into his lap, knee on either side. 

He doesn’t think it’s a matter of seduction, but maybe Sergio doesn’t know himself as well as he would like to. Each time Iker looks hesitant, Sergio convinces him otherwise, until any moral inclination fades away into memories of things that never quite manifested.

 

“I thought you said you would be better for me,” Iker groans one day into Sergio’s mouth. The teenager is pressed flush against him on the couch and Iker’s barely holding his hand away from vital regions. Sergio’s a fast learner and far too eager for his own good.

“For you,” Sergio laughs against Iker’s mouth. He presses a hand against Iker’s chest. “I never said anything about your soul.”

Iker groans again, but not for the same reason this time.

“I’m definitely going to a special sort of hell,” he says before brushing his lips down Sergio’s throat. It vibrates under his lips, because Sergio laughs again.

“How fucking cliché, Casillas.”

Iker stops to suck at Sergio’s pulse point. The younger boy immediately spasms under his attention, although not enough to force him away. Sergio’s body feels like jelly and he’s still adjusting to how it reacts when he’s kissed or touched in certain ways. Especially by Iker.

“Your family would kill me if they knew,” he mutters.

Sergio presses harder against Iker’s body, unintentionally grinding into him. He’s still too young to understand the full extent of consequences for that simple action.

“So don’t tell them.”

“ _Fuck_ Sergio—no, fuck, off.”

Iker manages to push the younger boy off of him. Sergio licks at his lips nervously and feels uncertain. He’s always uncertain around Iker. For someone who is usually so self assured, it’s killing him. 

“Don’t look at me like that, Serge,” Iker says, frowning. When that doesn’t change anything, he changes tactics and presses _Sergio_ back against the cushions instead. He’s more careful than the other boy, mostly because he knows what he’s doing better. 

Sergio seems appeased and winds his arms around Iker’s waist so that he can pull him closer. Iker lets out a muffled sort of sound and Sergio takes the opportunity to slide his tongue into the slightly open mouth. 

He’s a fast learner.

Sergio grins widely and his long hair fans out across his shoulder and onto Iker’s. Iker simply shakes his head in exasperation and presses closer, with a small smile of his own.

“Definitely going to hell.”

 

Iker doesn’t put a name to it and Sergio doesn’t force it. Sometimes, when Iker is studying for midterms and finals, Sergio doesn’t see him for weeks at a time. He thinks he should accept invitations from people his own age to go out, but he never does.

He’s always afraid when he knocks on the door after one of those periods that Iker’s going to open it and stare at him strangely or that David’s going to be the one to answer. Sergio never sees David again and Iker always looks pleased, albeit guilty, to see him, so his stomach eventually unclenches as the college boy drags him inside.

 

Sergio has mixed feelings about birthdays. On the one hand, they’re an excellent excuse to have a party. On the other hand, something about birthday cakes and presents seems so trivial and juvenile that it makes him flinch. When Jesus asks why he isn’t more excited, Sergio just shrugs. Maybe he’s grown up too fast, he doesn’t know. Maybe he has a different kind of soul altogether.

On his fourteenth birthday, Sergio declines his family’s offer to throw him an actual party. He appreciates the family dinner his mother cooks—with all of his favorite foods; tortillas and guacamole, seafood paella, and chocolate cake with a side of sangria—but mostly he’s just happy not to be thirteen anymore. He thinks, briefly, that maybe Iker will finally stop treating him like a child he might break.

He escapes from the house after opening his presents, says he’s going to run over to Antonio’s for the evening. In reality, he ducks away from his parents’ and brothers’ gaze and tiptoes next door. He tries the doorknob and it’s unlocked, so he pushes in. 

He toes his shoe off and plods through the now-familiar, empty hallway. He finds the living room and it’s empty too, but there’s a wrapped present in the middle of the coffee table. Sergio grins and tries the corridor to Iker’s room. 

There’s mostly silence there too, but as Sergio quietly pushes the door open, he sees Iker’s figure standing up and facing out the window. Sergio grins and bounds forward, wrapping an arm around Iker’s shoulders from behind. He’s shot up enough over the last year that he’s almost taller than Iker now.

Iker jerks, almost violently, and whirls around, looking vaguely panicked. When he sees who it is, his shoulders relax a little, but they’re still mostly tense.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he exclaims and it’s only then that Sergio notices that Iker’s holding a phone to his ear. “What? No, not you. Okay, listen I have to go. Okay, yeah. Call me later. Bye.”

He hangs up the phone and exhales. He looks annoyed for all of two seconds before Sergio’s worried face makes him smile.

“Jesus Cristo Sergio, try knocking next time?”

“It was open!” Sergio protests. He leans forward greedily for his kiss anyway and Iker laughs before assenting.

“Yeah, I forgot about that.” Iker grins and pulls away. “Happy birthday.”

“Thanks.” Sergio smiles and lets go of Iker’s shoulders. He’s fourteen now and no longer the same child who was desperate for Iker’s attention. He’s older now, more mature. He can play it cool. 

“Fourteen, huh?” Iker says, thoughtfully. “I remember—”

“Shut up, Casillas,” Sergio rolls his eyes. “No memory lane today, for the love of God.”

Iker grins and shrugs.

“Fine. Want to open your present?”

“Mmm, is there an after present?”

Iker laughs and swipes at Sergio’s head. The younger boy just grins and follows Iker into the living room.

“You’re here so much, you might as well move in,” Iker smirks as he throws the present at Sergio. Sergio catches it smoothly. 

“Thanks, hombre,” he grins and begins opening the package. At first, he teases the taped corners away carefully before Iker raises an eyebrow at him. He laughs and sets into the paper, tearing it as impatiently as he feels. Under the paper, there’s a small white box, which is also taped. “Who taught you to wrap gifts, Jesus this is so fucking annoying.”

Iker snorts, but says nothing. Sergio finally manages to open the white box. 

It’s a pair of ridiculous, large, sleek sunglasses. And by ridiculous, Sergio means they’re the coolest fucking things he’s ever seen. They’re obnoxious and look expensive and Sergio knows even before he puts them on that they’re fucking perfect. 

He slides them over the bridge of his nose.

“Do I look older? Cooler? Wiser? More mature?”

“Mmm and so much more,” Iker says and within minutes, Sergio finds his limbs tangled and back pressed against the wall. “So about that after-present.”

Sergio’s heart spritzes a little in his chest and his glasses press uncomfortably into Iker’s forehead as their mouths move close together. He lets out a pleasant, pleased sound at not tasting cigarettes on Iker’s tongue for the first time in months. Iker’s fingers brush the little bit of skin that sticks out as Sergio’s shirt hikes up slightly. It makes the younger boy shiver, makes his breath catch in his throat for the touch.

“You’re the best fucking boyfriend.” Sergio lets slip, accidental, the words almost moaned.

It happens just like that.

Suddenly, Iker freezes, hands splayed at Sergio’s thin hips, lips coming to a halt and then breaking away.

“Don’t say boyfriend,” Iker says. He looks distinctly uncomfortable and wary and it makes Sergio’s gut twist. 

The frown that presses into Sergio’s lip says more than his words could.

“Why not?”

“You’re too young for that kind of thing,” is Iker’s reply.

A hot flash of anger spreads through Sergio’s stomach and he immediately grabs at his glasses to take them off. He glares at Iker once his eyes can be seen.

“I’m fourteen fucking years old.”

“That’s _not_ old enough—”

“Fuck you Iker, I’m not a _child_.”

“Sergio,” Iker’s eyes flash warningly and it makes Sergio feel so much like a child being reprimanded that he lets out a strangled cry of frustration.

He shoves against Iker’s chest. 

“What am I going to have to do to prove to you that I am _not_ a child? I know what I fucking want, and I fucking want _you_ for some fucking reason, you fucking _asshole_.”

Iker frowns in response, although he doesn’t respond to Sergio’s provocations. The younger boy shoves at him again.

“If you don’t fucking want me, just tell me. Stop stringing me along and making me think I have a chance if I don’t.”

Even his breathing is angry, a trembling sort of wet fury rushing through his veins as a migraine threatens to spill out across his temples. He doesn’t look at Iker, his eyes are black and trained hard on the floor. They feel like they could be wet, but Sergio pointedly ignores it. Pointedly keeps from turning them upward. He thinks if he looks up at Iker now, he’ll probably deck him for being a dick.

There’s a moment when Sergio thinks Iker’s going to do it—he’s going to tell Sergio to stop being a fucking idiot and move on, to stop wanting more than he has, because it’s greedy, because it never meant anything, because he’s _only fourteen years old_ and apparently, in Iker’s mind, that’s equivalent to him wearing diapers. 

But, surprisingly, he just hears Iker exhale instead.

“Okay. I’m sorry.”

That’s certainly not what he expected to hear. 

A pause.

“I do, fuck. I shouldn’t, but I do.” Sergio still doesn’t look up, so Iker guides his chin and face up with a finger. “I’m sorry, gypsy, let’s not fight on your birthday, okay?”

Sergio looks at him tensely before finally letting his shoulders relax. 

“You’re actually the biggest dick I know,” he says. His voice is a little irritated, but mostly that’s all abated now.

“I know,” Iker sighs. “Lo siento.”

His expression immediately softens and he tugs Sergio toward him again. Curling his fingers around the younger boy’s cheeks, he presses a birthday kiss to his lips.

Sergio thinks fourteen is going to be a hell of a lot more complicated than thirteen. He doesn’t actually realize until later how right he is.

 

Mostly they spend time together in private, choosing to just be neighbors as far as the public is concerned. Sergio’s parents have no idea and neither does his older brother, although he thinks that Jesus and Antonio probably suspect. He’s always been shit at hiding things from them anyway.

It’s never anything over the top or blatantly romantic. Iker isn’t particularly romantic and Sergio is honestly still too young to want anything like that or really even know what it means. Mostly, it’s a comfortable coexistence mixed with just enough experimentation and learning and neither of them mind enough to change it, even if they had an idea of what they would change it to.

Mostly, it’s them lying together on Iker’s bed, Sergio sprawled across working on math problems while Iker does his required readings, or stretched on Iker’s couch, Sergio’s head in Iker’s lap as they watch a movie, or making meals in the kitchen, Iker actually cooking and Sergio mostly just making a mess of condiments and spices. Mostly, it’s Sergio pulling at Iker’s shirt, Sergio pinning him against the couch cushion, Sergio straddling him and pressing forward and Iker trying to resist, Iker trying to slow him down, Iker finally giving up and kissing him until they’ve both run out of breath for the time being and then some.

 

They lie on Iker’s couch, as usual. Sergio puts The Godfather in and settles back onto the couch, lying across it with his head in Iker’s lap as is routine. The Godfather is too slow for his tastes, but the acting is undeniably superb and he doesn’t mind the violence at all. It’s Iker’s pick tonight; Sergio had been gunning for Pulp Fiction for the millionth time, but Iker had point-blank refused, saying he would rather off himself than watch John Travolta yet again. 

“Al Pacino looks so young,” Sergio comments, probably for the five hundredth time, as his eyes glance appreciatively over the legend’s younger body. “So fucking hot.”

Iker chuckles. One of his hands rests in Sergio’s hair and he’s seconds away from playing with it, just like the younger boy likes. 

“Robert Redford wasn’t too bad himself.” 

Sergio wrinkles his face and looks up at Iker.

“Who the fuck cares about Redford? _Pacino_ , are you watching him?”

Iker presses his first two fingers teasingly to Sergio’s eyelids, forcing them shut.

“No, I’m watching The Godfather for Diane Keaton.”

Sergio’s eyes struggle against Iker’s fingers until he swats his hand away.

“Fucking bitch. God what I’d give to have—”

“ _Sergio_.”

Sergio sighs exaggeratedly and rolls his eyes.

“— _tea_ with him. Honestly Iker, do you not think I know what sex is?”

It’s Iker’s turn to roll his eyes now.

“Of course you know. Fucking fourteen year old.” 

Sergio grins, delighted as he always is whenever he makes Iker curse without getting anger involved. He wraps his fingers around Iker’s collar and tugs him down for a kiss.

Iker sighs, but smiles as he assents.

“You’re too young for sex,” he says and it’s a matter of absolute fact, no argument to be had.

“That’s what you think,” Sergio smirks and that earns him a playful shove against his chest.

“Brat.”

That makes Sergio laugh, although he notices that Iker is suddenly slightly tenser than he was just a second ago. Instead, the older boy seems to change tactics.

Iker runs his fingers through Sergio’s hair, nails scraping lightly against his scalp. Sergio shivers a little and rolls closer to Iker.

“Your hair’s getting long, gypsy.”

Sergio shakes it a little in response and long brown strands fly this way and that until they settle messily around his face and shoulders. He catches Iker looking at him in that same strange way he notices sometimes. It looks a little like awe or a little like longing, but Sergio thinks it’s probably just bemusement at the ridiculous boy in his lap.

“Want me to cut it?”

Iker seems to consider his words for a second before shaking his head seriously.

“No. I love it this way.”

Iker’s words warm the skin above Sergio’s chest and the space below it. There’s a familiar tingling feeling that starts in that same place and spreads like wildfire across his gangly limbs, to the tips of his appendages. It makes him curl into Iker a little more, smile into the older boy’s stomach in an attempt to hide the fact that his honey skin has tinged pink. 

“Don’t cut it,” Iker insists, his fingers now working smooth circles beneath Sergio’s hair. 

Sergio closes his eyes with a sleepy, happy smile.

“Never.”

 

Sometimes, Sergio will still stay awake, listening for Iker’s car to come home. He starts coming home earlier and Sergio likes to think that it’s because of him. Maybe that’s too naïve or maybe that’s too idealistic, but even his parents have commented that Iker looks happier lately, so it’s not a horrible assumption to make. 

Every once in a while, though, the college boy will stumble in late. He’s never so drunk anymore and he rarely smokes, but every once in a while, Sergio will wake up to whispers of conversations on the phone outside. He still creeps to the window to try to listen, but these days Iker is more careful about the volume of his voice, almost as though he’s hiding something and he knows Sergio is waiting to find out what. 

Sergio never hears a particular name or a particular topic when he _does_ manage to catch a phrase or two from under his windowsill, but he always thinks that, for some reason, Iker sounds awfully sad.

 

It’s not really that Sergio is desperate to have sex. He’s curious, sure, and probably wouldn’t mind it, sure, but he’s a teenage boy and which teenage boy isn’t, to some extent, obsessed with sex? For Sergio, it’s more a game. How far can he nudge Iker before the older boy’s eyes narrow? How many times can he hint at it before Iker’s shoulders tense and he moves away? How much innuendo can he make before Iker shifts uncomfortably and stops meeting his eyes? At first, the reactions are faster. It only takes a few hints or a few well-placed remarks for Iker to stop the conversation and glare at him. Slowly, it takes him longer and longer to react until, after a while, Sergio wonders whether or not Iker isn’t always just restraining himself around him. 

 

It’s after they’ve come home from the movie theaters—Iker insists that it’s not a date, but Sergio just smirks and asks him why he paid for both of them before Sergio could pull out his wallet; Iker doesn’t have a response to that—and are settled on Iker’s bed after having drinks in the living room. Sergio had already told his family that he was staying late at Antonio’s house to study for an upcoming math exam and he’s in no rush. Iker seems a little off, maybe a little upset, but mostly he isn’t in a rush either, although by the way he moves against Sergio, any innocent bystander would question it. 

Iker is always careful not to go too far, always careful to stop just short of clothing being discarded because he’s Iker Casillas and Sergio has since learned how measured and controlled he can be when he wants to be. Sergio can tell how much it frustrates the older boy, though, which is the cause of many of their arguments because, as Sergio insists, _if we’re both fucking frustrated, then why can’t we do something about it, fuck Iker._

The older boy never listens, although tonight he’s a little drunker than he usually is. 

Sergio moans into Iker’s throat as the college boy sucks on his neck roughly, teeth pulling hard against his skin in a way that it never has before. The younger boy has since become somewhat acclimated to how his body reacts to Iker’s touch, but Iker is far more hands-on tonight, far less careful than he usually is, so it’s almost as though his body has to adjust all over again. 

Sergio can feel his breath becoming shallower and his pants slowly tightening and his fingers scrabble for purchase against Iker’s sides. Iker is having none of it, though. He doesn’t remove his mouth from that spot—it’s almost as though he’s determined to have it bruise, determined to mark Sergio as his even though he’s still ambiguous about that detail—and pushes Sergio back until he’s flat and desperately pulling Iker down over him.

“ _Fuck, Iker_ ,” Sergio moans again as Iker’s lips and teeth move faster against his skin, trailing down from the bruised spot to nip and lick at his collarbone. In the meantime, the older boy’s hands slip forcefully under Sergio’s shirt, slightly rough palms and dull nails moving against Sergio’s bare skin until he whimpers because it’s almost painful to feel how frantic and desperate it is. 

If Iker hears Sergio, he makes no motion to stop or even change his tactics. His hands never stop and his kisses never lose their edge and after another minute, Sergio can barely breathe and he’s so tight that it hurts.

“Iker, fuck, Iker, stop,” he rasps out. When Iker doesn’t seem to hear him, Sergio groans and sets his hands against Iker’s shoulders and pushes against them enough that the other boy is forced to break away. 

“ _What_?” Iker rasps back and his eyes are so clouded over with desire and what he’s been doing that it catches in Sergio’s throat. 

“It hurts,” Sergio almost whimpers. His breathing is so shallow that he doesn’t think that he’s getting enough oxygen to his brain. He closes his eyes and holds forcefully onto Iker’s shirt, moves his hips up so that maybe some of the friction will ease the tension caught tightly in his pants.

That seems to make Iker hesitate. He licks his lips and studies Sergio, although his eyes are really too glazed to see anything he doesn’t want. 

“I shouldn’t,” he somehow says and Sergio groans at the older boy’s restraint. It’s almost literally _killing_ him. 

“Worry about your soul later,” Sergio growls and roughly forces Iker’s hand from under his shirt to just above the zipper of his jeans.

Iker seems to hesitate just once more before Sergio bites down on his neck and bucks his hips up. For one reason or another that seems to stop his conscience and he drags Sergio’s zipper down before plunging his hand under.

 

Iker works fast and frenzied, although Sergio thinks he still feels an edge of hesitation where he doesn’t want there to be any. When he’s done and Sergio is breathing roughly into his neck, the younger boy whispers hot and wet against his ear. 

“I could do it for you too,” he says, hand already finding its position. Iker moves to stop him, but Sergio is faster and already drags his zipper down. 

What Iker was expecting, he doesn’t know, but Sergio is sure by his stiff reaction that he wasn’t expecting to be pushed onto his back, wasn’t expecting to suddenly be straddled himself, wasn’t expecting Sergio’s pink and swollen lips to move down to where he couldn’t see it anymore.

“Sergio—you don’t know—”

Iker can probably feel, rather than see, Sergio grinning against his abdomen and Sergio obstinately refusing to listen to him. 

“Just tell me if I’m doing it right,” is all he says before he tugs the top of Iker’s pants down and his mouth disappears and Iker is squirming within seconds. He never actually does say anything, but his moans are telling enough.

It’s Sergio’s first time giving anything and he doesn’t think he knows what he’s doing, but he’s a quick learner. His mouth is almost too good and he assures Iker after that it might have been his first, but it certainly won’t be his last.

 

Iker is mostly good at managing his emotions. His poker face is hard, but not infallible. He thinks he hides everything well, but Sergio knows what to look for. When they’re together, Iker seems to relax more, seems to open himself up more, seems to be a little happier and smile more. But even then, he always seems distracted. Sad, somehow, in an intangible way that Sergio can’t really see, but can feel hovering just below the surface. He checks his phone constantly—usually when he doesn’t think Sergio is looking—and his face always falls when he doesn’t seem to find what he’s looking for. It’s as though he’s waiting for a message that just won’t come.

It makes Sergio sad, to an extent, but generally it just makes something tug at his guts, because there’s this entire side to Iker he knows absolutely nothing about. He’s laid himself bare to the older boy; he has no secret left to hide except one that even he’s not sure of yet. 

One day, Sergio tilts his head toward Iker, searches eyes that he sometimes thinks can’t see him. 

“Iker.” 

“Hmm?” Iker doesn’t even look up from his schoolwork. 

Sergio looks down at his own work on the dining table and feels his mouth go dry. 

“Why do you always look so sad?” he asks softly.

_Don’t I make you happy?_ he wonders.

There’s a pregnant pause as Sergio expects Iker to answer and Iker finally processes the question. He looks up into Sergio’s concerned eyes and, for a moment, Sergio can almost imagine Iker letting him in. 

_You make me happiest, gypsy_ , he imagines Iker responding.

Iker shakes his head. 

“It’s nothing,” he says instead. He goes back to working on his statistical analysis. 

Sergio doesn’t press the issue, but every day Iker looks subtly sadder and every day Sergio thinks he can feel a crack somewhere in his chest where there wasn’t one before.

 

Sergio finds himself convincing Iker to get drunk more often. It’s the only time the other boy will let down his guard enough to stop thinking and just let his instincts take over. Mostly, on those nights, Iker does just enough to Sergio without going too far and always stops Sergio from returning the favor. At first Sergio minds, but then he doesn’t care. He realizes, after a while, that he just wants to see Iker smile.

 

It doesn’t really deteriorate, not really. It’s nothing so cliché as constant fights or repressing little things that build into one large thing. On the contrary, they work so well together, fit so well together, that Sergio almost thinks that Iker has forgotten their age difference. They watch movies together on the weekends and go out to find food when Sergio—teenage boy that he is—gets strange cravings and is generally starving and watch Real Madrid matches with Sergio’s family and do homework together a lot of the time as well. They spend a lot of time on Iker’s couch or on Iker’s bed or against Iker’s wall. 

Sergio sees Antonio a lot less and feels slightly guilty about it, but Iker seems to go to fewer and fewer parties too, so he forgets to feel guilty sometimes and feels happy instead. Iker seems to just stay in his house most of the time and always seems to be waiting for Sergio to call him or text him or just show up on his front doorsteps. He always seems overwhelmingly glad to see Sergio, but after a while, even Sergio starts to question why Iker can never seem to call first.

 

He’s sitting on Iker’s couch, texting Antonio while he waits for the college boy. Iker is rummaging through his kitchen for Doritos and beer. Any moral qualms that he had had about a fourteen year old drinking—much like any qualms he had had about shoving said fourteen year old against a wall and kissing him and groping him until neither of them could breathe anymore—have long since passed.

Sergio is in the middle of a text describing his new favorite band when his phone lights up with another message. He stops his and clicks into the text. 

It’s short and simple.

_**from:** jesu_

_i miss u ses_

Sergio isn’t sure what about that slows his breathing. He isn’t sure what about those four words makes his heart dawdle, makes his limbs heavier, makes his vision fog. He isn’t sure whether it’s because it’s Jesus—his brother, his soul mate—or if it’s because something about those four words—how they feel, how they fit together, what they mean—symbolizes in an almost tangible way how much he aches sometimes.

“I got you one,” Iker finally comes back from the kitchen, two bottles of beer in hand and a large bag of chips under his arm. “No Doritos, but you like Lays, right?”

When Sergio doesn’t say anything, Iker’s eyebrows furrow. 

“Sergio?”

Sergio takes in a rattling breath, because somehow, his throat is so wet that the air that he breathes in comes out humid. He ignores the burning in his eyes because he’s just too tired to give in at this point.

“Sergi—” Iker tries again, firmer this time, but Sergio cuts him off.

“Sese. My name is Sese.”

Iker’s frown deepens.

“What—”

“ _Sese_ , Iker.” Sergio’s voice is tight, his words shriller than they ever have been. He’s clenching his fists so hard that his nails break through the skin at his palms. He doesn’t give a fuck. “You’ve known me for over a fucking year now, the least you can do is act like it.”

Iker looks stunned, shocked, taken aback—about a half a dozen synonyms that barely flit through Sergio’s mind. What he notices is not how surprised the college boy looks. What he notices is how Iker tenses. What he notices is how he shakes his head almost imperceptibly. What he notices is how Iker doesn’t look surprised at what Sergio’s _saying_ —it’s almost as though he’s resigned, as though he’s only surprised that it’s taken Sergio this long to ask. 

“Sergio—”

And even then. Sergio shakes his head, nearly shaking from repressed anger, and pushes himself to his feet.

“ _Sergio_ , where are you go—”

Sergio doesn’t let him finish, not in that tone, not with that message behind it.

“Fuck you, Casillas,” he spits out before slamming the door behind him.

 

Sergio doesn’t speak to Iker for three weeks. He checks his phone every day for a missed call, a text message, anything. 

There’s never anything waiting for him. He’s usually the one waiting.

 

They eventually make up, but only when Sergio comes to Iker’s door again. Iker looks relieved, but Sergio just looks resigned. He’s fourteen years old and he can already feel something that’s shaped so bitterly like the fading of hearts that he eats less and less because his stomach churns more and more. 

When they kiss, it tastes like endings, not beginnings.

He can’t seem to get rid of that taste, no matter how hard he tries.

 

It was easier, Sergio realizes, when Iker’s car was coming home later and later because at least then, it was coming home at all.

 

Sergio knocks on Iker’s door near the end of the school year. He has finals in a week, so he knows that Iker probably has his this week. Iker opens the door and looks stressed. When Sergio steps over the doorstep, he looks stressed. When he pushes his books off the couch and pins Sergio against the cushions, hand digging underneath the elastic of boxers, no pretense needed, he looks stressed. He only stops looking stressed when Sergio forces his face in place between his hands, when he forces some calm into him by mouthing it there. 

“My gypsy,” is all that Iker breathes out.

He doesn’t look stressed, only guilty.

 

Finals end and Sergio is fairly sure that he’s passed. He spends the night out with his friends and waits exactly until noon to show up at his neighbor’s doorstep. 

He knocks once, rapping his knuckles against wood. 

There’s no answer.

He frowns and tries again, tries the doorbell like a civilized human being this time.

There’s no answer.

He stands there for ten minutes trying various techniques and wild codes, but Iker never answers the door.

 

It ends as suddenly as it starts. One day Iker’s car is there, the next it’s been replaced by a moving sign. In retrospect, Sergio thinks he should have seen it coming. In retrospect, it really shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did, serrated, rough knives stabbing sharp, screaming pain into every reachable centimeter.

In retrospect, Sergio was probably naïve for expecting a goodbye.

 

He waits for a week to hear something. Then a month. Then two months. When Iker’s house is sold over the summer, Sergio stops waiting.

Instead, he walks into the bathroom, finds a pair of scissors and coolly, calmly, robotically, chops off almost all of his hair.

 

That was the first and only time Sergio Ramos took scissors to his hair. Kneeling on his bed with the shears beside him, his jagged, uneven hair was as much of a mess as he felt, tears unbidden, throat and eyes so burning that even the licking of flames couldn’t ease the pain crushing through his chest. He took a handful of that long hair and threw it to the side and only crumpled himself when he heard a small gasp and small arms immediately around him to catch him.

“Ses?” Jesus’s voice was the only one he could have bared to hear anyway, so it really was almost a godsend that he was there just when Sergio needed someone to hold him as he broke.

 

_Sergio finds **him** less than a year later. He’s nothing like Iker, not even close. There’s no warmth to his eyes, no intelligence or curiosity in his voice. He has little to no desire to meet Sergio’s family. He doesn’t care what movies Sergio watches. He laughs, but the sound curls in his throat, as though he’s hiding how condescending he actually is. He never actually succeeds. _

_It’s not a good relationship and he isn’t gentle when he takes Sergio’s virginity. Sergio thinks maybe he deserves better, but by the time he realizes flowering purple bruises aren’t what he wants, they’ve already turned yellow at the edges and he’s already gotten used to wearing long sleeves._

**Author's Note:**

>  **More notes:** Since this will never be written into the story, but I thought it would give good perspective/insight into Iker, he went to college with Villa. They ran in the same social circle, more or less, only Villa was one of those bad boys~ and Iker always had a thing for them. Long story short, he pursued him after he found out that Villa swung both ways. It … clearly paid off. He was just realizing that Villa would never be in a real relationship with him  & he was too much for him to handle when Sergio interrupted their progression.
> 
> Also, re: Iker’s phone calls. It’s not the obvious. Think about it and you’ll figure it out. : )
> 
> Sorry for the ending, Sergio did eventually get out of the relationship and he left home to take care of himself around the same time. He matures a lot by the time he meets Fernando, but he still has a lot to sort through. Who knows if he’ll see Iker again? 
> 
> Well, I mean. I do. You don’t. Yet. : )


End file.
